The EU’s new transatlantic data transfer deal with the US has been signed off by the 27 EU Member States, ending three years of legal uncertainty. By finally ratifying the European Commission’s adequacy decision, national governments formally approved the new EU-US Data Privacy Framework, which the Commission has adopted.
The decision means that EU and US businesses will soon have full legal certainty again to transfer personal data across the Atlantic. Recently, the US government announced that it had completed all necessary steps for implementation.
The Computer and Communications Industry Association (CCIA Europe) has long advocated for a durable legal framework facilitating EU-US data flows while protecting people’s privacy.
US President, Joe Biden, signed an Executive Order last year, introducing new data protection safeguards for EU citizens. The Order also established a two-step redress mechanism, allowing Europeans to enforce those protections before US independent authorities.
In December 2022, the European Commission acknowledged that these new safeguards will provide Europeans with a level of data protection that is equivalent to EU law. National governments, however, still had to approve that so-called adequacy decision. Data flows are vital to transatlantic trade and the EU-US economic relationship, which is worth €5.5 trillion per year. Nevertheless, the two economies had been left without guidelines for data transfers after an EU Court ruling invalidated the previous framework back
